Corporate America Question

Jeremy Ordan

Jeremy Ordan

Major Contributor
I work for a rather large corporation in a sales capacity. Everyday there is a report run on how many outbound phone calls we make and our total talk time for the day. A couple of months ago whoever made the most phone calls would have their name hilighted or little goofy stars around them. Almost like a good job notion.

Lately management has changed. They are now hilighting the people who make under the minimum of 50 required phone calls per day.

My cube neighbor made 12 yesterday. She is on the phone with our HR department right now freaking out about being harassed and singled out.

I just wanted to know, from other people in corporate America, if the practice of singling out individuals who are not performing is common, encouraged, or whatever.

Personally, I have mixed feelings, but rather than consoling her I'm here at my desk looking like I'm typing an email while I compose this post...
 
Enron used to have employee evaluations every quarter, people were rated not only by their superiors, but by their peers. The bottom 10% were fired every quarter.

Dell does very similar things (not as quantifiable as Enron, but similar) if they don't hit their goals. And I mean if the COMPANY doesn't hit it's quarterly goal, not the specific employee in question.

My point is, yes, I would say that it is a general trend in business to shift from highlight the achievers to highlighting the 'underperformers.' But I don't have any real proof so I should probably just be quiet on the issue.
:)
 
I'm not in the position you're in, but it seems to me sales people get it real bad. Their job performance always seems predicated on bare bones numbers, with little regard to what it takes to make a sale.

Corporate America is always trying to 'measure productivity'. That makes when your employees make widgets, and you can measure how many widgets are made an hour/day/month, and you can stack that against the cost of raw materials, labor, overhead, etc, etc.

But we're in a knowledge/skill based economy. We should be based on the value of our *ideas* not how many phone calls we made today. Media work seems the same way - sitting at my desk, jotting down notes doesn't look like work, but in fact it may help turn out a tremendous script.

So I think you're on to a real problem. We're using 19th century industrial methods of tracking productivity in the 21st century.
 
we will be a service based economy. We will be asking "Fries with that?" to a Korean General or "Paper or Plastic?" to a Indian businessman.
 
Sales are the backbone to any company. Treat your back well (bend at the knees) and it will be good to you. Pointing out those who misbehave or don't pull their own weight may work in grammar school, but it will just make employees (adults) disgruntled and unmotivated.

Someone already quoted Office Space, but there's another scene in the movie that works well for this thread. The boss (Mike Judge) is talking to Jennifer Anniston about her waitress uniform and lack of flair.

Boss: "Now, it's up to you whether or not you want to just do the bare
minimum. Well, like Brian, for example, has 37 pieces of flair. And a
terrific smile."


Just hang in there Santa. Only two more weeks till the holidays.
pk
 
I work for the(gag)#1 cell phone provider in America in customer support. Every week, I'm told the same thing: Take care of the customers no matter what...but also make sure you're handle time is low even if that means getting these people out of here. Also make sure that you do whatever it takes to set the customer right, if they ask why a cell tower is always down, tell them about ROLLOVER and how great it is!
 
This makes people do just enough work to keep people off of their backs. Why bust your ass if you're not going to see any real reward for your efforts?
 
I told my boss almost exactly that Horsefilms, you know what? he couldn't do a thing about it. In fact, he said "Maybe you should try finding another job." To which I replied, "The only way I'm leaving here is kicking and screaming."
 
I also love how nobody can do anything without it being approved by about 3 commitees.

I do a bit of video work for an extremely stuffy corporation. It takes forever to get anything decided, only to have everything change 2 days later.
 
I know I started this topic and all, but I have been in this position of 'selling education' for the last two years. In that time period I've had nothing but good success, promotion, and seen my salary grow. I've never had to look at it from anyone elses point of view. I think that there is something utterly disgusting from a management point of view though to illustrate and highlight the outputs of people who are not meeting minimum expectations.

I am far from a positive person, and rather than saying that the glass is half full or half empty, I just ***** that it is a glass and not a jug (if that makes any sense), but I think that this action my my manager is just negative reinforcement.

To update, the call to HR must have worked though. They have been in an hour long closed door conference and the tracker has been taken down.
 
Good. It's funny to me that corporations preach "unity" and being a "team player" and then they single people out like that. It doesn't exactly boost office moral.
 
I deal with stuff like that every day. I've learned that the only way I can survive is to know my own personal work ethic and do my job within that criteria. If I can do my job well enough that I feel good about it, then I let all the corporate measurements, strength of the company, etc. work itself out. As a result, any time I get an e-mail with our individual measurements, it goes right in the trash. I don't even open them anymore.
 
I've had three different sales jobs and all of them publically posted things like call times, sales made, etc. It comes with the job.
 
Corporate America is why I became an Entreprenuer. If you have seen Offie Space; that was last job.

A pathetic joke.
 
My dad is self-employed....and things can get kinda tight...but i know he's happier and more satisfied with his life than most of my friends dads.
 
I've developed sales teams for several companies.

I can't generalize for all companies, but most do (and should) develop metrics (measurements) for their employee performance. Sales is a tough area. Sure, you can and should focus on an individual that is underperforming, but the manager has to do it one on one, and make sure that the metrics mean something.

I've seen situations where, according to the measurements, the person is underperforming, but a quick discussion with the indivual makes me realize that they are doing an amazing job. I know of one management consultant, Dr. Keith Mathis, that was in a very similar situation to you. A new sales manager came in, and tore him down for not making enough calls, etc. That quarter, he far outperformed anyone else. At the end of the quarter, he quit, and the sales manager was surprised. Keith let him know he didn't feel supported.

True story, and it happens every day. Some sales organizations are run like a used car sales lot, which is not what I call true sales.

If you find a successful sales team, you will usually find a group that has high morale and a sales manager that knows how to lead, not just manage. HR departments can help reign in an over-zealous sales manager. Sometimes new sales managers come in and want to show how tough they are. It is counter-productive.

Finally, in regards to peer reviews, many companies do a 360 degree review, which means: their boss, their direct reports, as well as their co-workers. Intel uses it. It can be misused, but many of my friends that work at Intel find it useful.

Jack Welsh, the ex-CEO of GE, was very much into terminating the bottom 10-20% once in a while. Not all management consultants agree with him.

Good luck,

-Jerry
 
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